W9R2: At the end of the storm is a golden sky

[nowster]

Time: 7.40am. Weather: 14°C, broken cloud, breezy, wet underfoot

There's nothing penultimate about this one. The target is in sight.

As I mentioned yesterday, I took an extra rest day due to Storm Francis and a different sort of runs than one would usually discuss here.

It's a nice bright cool morning. I say hello to the next door neighbour who was setting off for work, and set off on the course I did back on W8R3(+1). My warm up walk is a brisk uphill and then it flattens out after about 5 mins.

Mini mistake: I'd set up my watch for an "activity" which would have included the times for 5 mins warm up, 30 mins running, and then an open-ended cool down. Except it didn't seem to take. Not a problem. I was also recording this on FitoTrack, and I started the watch manually when I started running.

When I get past the post office and onto the straight, the wind is slightly in my face, but that's nice. Because it's very slightly downhill, I get an easy fast pace on, hoping I don't regret it later.

Up the farm tracks, and I mean up. It's a climb. My cadence and pace drop, but I cope OK. The loo and stitch gremlins try to show themselves but I outrun them.

Left turn after the high school and down, down, down to the college. Once I'd got my second wind after the climb I realise it's possible to pick up a little speed, so I do. I sing along to a few of the lines from "Reviewing the Situation" (from Oliver!) on the radio. (It was today's text-in competition.) I even greet a couple of dog walkers.

The steep climb from the dip up to the traffic lights. Slow but doable. Done!

Now the home straight. Just keep going. Just keep going. Two minutes left. The slight rise. Just keep going.

A strange feeling of both being very tired but also that I could probably continue for a bit longer.

Jo says that time's up. I fumble with my watch. Nope, tapping the screen doesn't do anything. I'm still running. Aha! Push the side button in. Done! I've overshot the time by 15 seconds.

Oh so close to the 5km. But wow! I've improved my pace from last week by 8 seconds per km.

Roll on Friday!

Stats:

Distance: 4.87km (running), 5.9km including walks.

Pace (running): 6'13"/km. Splits (by km): 5'38", 6'42", 6'23", 6'11", 6'12"/km

Top speed: 12.2km/h, 4'54"/km (I think this has to be a glitch)

~~~

Today I was mostly listening to Marty in the Morning on RTÉ Lyric FM:

07:38 Tchaikovsky - Swan Lake: Black Swan Pas De Deux

07:41 Clifford T Ward - Scullery

07:46 John Williams - Gymnopedie No. 3 - For Guitar And Small Orchestra (Satie)

07:51 Philip Jones Brass - The Washington Post (Sousa)

07:54 Sting - When We Dance

08:02 Puccini - Chi Il Bel Sogno Di Doretta

08:04 Vaughan Williams - Fantasia On Greensleeves

08:12 The 4 Of Us - River Flows (Radio Mix)

08:17 Angela Hewitt - Prelude No.1 In C Major From The Well Tempered Clavier (J.S.Bach)

[Sara_Wales Graduate]

Fabulous run! Looking forward to reading how your graduation run goes!

[ground_level]

Twenty-six runs down, one to go; great going!

Look forward to the write-up of your graduation run.

[NorthernMonkey1 Graduate]

Smashing it!! Enjoy the graduation run 👍🏻

[224blue Graduate]

That’s a great run! Have a brilliant graduation run on Friday 👍🏻

[Jools2020 Graduate]

Great run, well done 👍

Looking forward to reading about your graduation 🎓 run on Friday!

[nowster Graduate in reply to Jools2020]

So am I. 🤣

[Kashara Graduate]

Great account! I’m on the same run as you, hope to do run 3 on Friday. I had a very mixed soundtrack today too, I was listening to one of my Spotify playlists which is a sort of junk room for tracks I like but don’t know where to put them ( it’s called Stuff) and today I had Heroin by Velvet Underground followed by a very old recording of The Teddy Bears Picnic then a Massive Attack track, none of which seemed to have much connection with a very windy run by the sea.

[nowster Graduate in reply to Kashara]

My jukebox radio stream is like that. Your recording of Teddy Bear's Picnic is probably the version by Henry Hall and His BBC Orchestra from 1932, vocals by Val Rosing.

[Kashara Graduate in reply to nowster]

Indeed it is, and I chose it because we had it on an ancient 78 record when I was small.

[BexJogs Graduate]

Excellent!! Your route sounds fun. I'm glad only the right kind of runs happened for you... One left - exciting!! Will you catch that 5k I wonder? You're so close! Good luck with the final push and make sure you post so we can celebrate with you!

[nowster Graduate in reply to BexJogs]

I have definitely had some hard runs along the way

I did start C25K twice in March/April, eventually giving up because of the medication I was on. The first week was particularly hard the first time, especially when I unthinkingly added a tiny bit of a hill (in a graveyard of all places) to it.

Then I started again in late June. The first three weeks went well, probably because I'd already done week 1 twice and week 2 once.

Week 4 was hard. W4R3 in particular was a right swine. That was probably the weather.

Week 5 on the other hand was a revelation. Weeks 6 and 7 were still hard work. Being more experienced by week 8, things became very slightly less hard and varying the routes helped.

I know I'm still going too fast, but I can work on mixing things up after graduation, as others have done.